Girls that age are evil, evil spawns of satan. I'm sure they don't even know why they act the way they do. In my day, I could at least go home and get away from that crap. I can't imagine being that age today and having to deal with that on the phone and online.

69gnarkill69:Yeah, turning off the phone and PC is hard. If everyone that gets bullied killed themselves we would cease to exist. Some people have issues that they can't get over and we are quick to blame outside influences for what is often poor parenting. Not sure if that is the case here, but I'm finding it harder and harder to find sympathy anymore, nobody accepts any responsibilities.

My kid is getting a phone, but it's not going to be a full-featured one. It's going to be a severely limited dumb phone from a few years ago. It will be used to make calls to emergency services, parents, grandparents, school (if necessary) and friends for the purpose of arranging get-togethers and sleepovers.

But no kid under 17 needs a smartphone. Any parent who supplies a data plan to their kids along with a smartphone is asking for trouble.

This proliferation of single-parent homes in which the mother is the only one taking care of the children and fathers are only around 2 weekends a month is not only disastrous to boys, but it's also catastrophic to young girls. Without a strong, stabilizing force like a father in the home, these children are raised by mercurial women who are stretched to the limit between supporting the household by working and managing the household after work.

Who was there to talk to this girl when the bullying got too bad? Who was there to tell her that girls are idiots (no offense intended) and that this kind of stuff will pass eventually? Who was there to consider moving to another district to get her out of that poisonous school?

"I blame myself" says this girl's mother. But you can't blame the mother for everything that happened. She's at her wit's end as it is, juggling a career and motherhood.

It's tragic and indicative of a much deeper problem in American society.

RenownedCurator:ut realistically, these other girls are also 12. They're vicious little beasts but they're kind of programmed to be that way. They're unlikely to really get the import of what happened to their victim for years. I also think that no matter how hounded someone has been, filing charges against someone because of someone else's suicide is a horrible precedent.

Not to go all femminist here, but we protect 12-year-old boys from the vicious behavior of other 12-year-old boys.

We've defined a legal system and society where "violence" is in a whole separate class from other forms of intentional interpersonal cruelty. In a broader context it's worth thinking about how that segregation of harms is both the result of traditional gender segregation and bad for men (like all segregation is hurts everyone, even the "better" class), but that's another discussion entirely.

When in conflict males tend to use direct violence; females tend to use social mechanisms (except in domestic relationships, when they're just as likely as males to use violence). But the intent of both actions is the same -- to hurt other people -- and it's not clear to me that intentional emotional harm should be any less of a crime than intention physical harm. We're slowly coming to the conclusion with respect to abuse cases, wherein psychological abuse is considered just as valid as physical abuse, but we're still a long way from accepting that concept in a wider context.

While I agree we shouldn't look backward from suicide (or any other self-direct event) to try to assign blame it is reasonable to define crimes around intentional harms to others, even absent actual violence of physical presence. It's easy to dismiss this as "just words" (in no small part because we have thousands of years of tradition telling us to do that) but imagine a husband saying these things to his wife over a period of years, while simultaneously working to limit her access to other social outlets, and using the requirements of law and her limited finances to ensure that she can't easily leave. We'd certainly call that behavior abusive, and at the very least we'd support the wife in efforts to leave and break off contact (including online/phone/etc. contact), and we might even prosecute the husband for his actions -- so why don't we offer the same support here for this 12-year-old girl who is required by law to attend school, not able to easily move or otherwise change schools for a whole variety of valid reasons, who has to put up with the social interference these other girls offered at that school, and who has to put up with all of this for years on end.

Or from an agist angle, consider this as a workplace harassment case -- if a group of your coworkers was harassing you, even outside of work, and you told your employer about it, we'd expect your employer to take action to end the behavior, possibly even firing your harassers. Why don't we expect the school to offer the same protection to its students?

bdub77:RogermcAllen: How do kids get away with this stuff nowadays? If me or any of my fellow students even thought about calling someone a biatch we would be in for a world of shiat. Here there is physical evidence of someone calling someone else a biatch and nothing.

Spare the lash, spoil the child.

/they didn't actually hit most of us in the 80's, but the threat of such actually meant something

I really don't buy into the whole you have to beat your kid nonsense. You do however have to threaten and back up your threats with action. Like, 'oh hey i heard you were bullying a kid in school, your cell phone has been cut off and you're grounded for a month and no allowance.' And then follow that up with a real talk about what it means to bully someone.

And you have to give your kid some independence to make the right decisions, but when they make the wrong ones you best back your sh*t up.

And when that doesn't work "because, like, OMG my parents are suuuch d-bags!"?

I've swatted my daughter twice, to teach her "no", and when that didn't work with no hitting, tapped her on the face when "no hit" didn't work (2yr olds can throw a helluva backhand). I agree with your parenting style, after going to a mandatory "cool your shiat" course, but this...no. If I found out my daughter was a bully, especially having been one/let myself be so, I'd do just exactly what my dad did: let/find the biggest, meanest, ugliest mofo I know and let her/him push her around until she actually feared for her life. There's a time for parenting, then there's a time for laying down the Golden Rule Handbook right upside the head.

tjsands1118:Okay odd idea, but what if we take a step back in techonolgy in kids and not allow them to have smart phones or use social media until they're eighteen? I mean most states a minor can't sign a binding contract without parental consent, and a end user agreement is sort of like a binding contract. Also I honestly believe phones are making people stupid.

THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS!!!!

There's NO DAMNED REASON a 12-year-old needs to be on Facebook, Ask.fm, or ANY other social media site. If they want to be social, let them do it in person, or by writing to pen pals, or by talking on a phone in the living room (not in their own room).

All this social media is farking with kids' heads. It's giving them WAY too much freedom WAY too early. They're forming social ties they shouldn't have to deal with until many years later, and these social ties come with the antagonistic force of the Internet's anonymity behind them.

The family computer should be in the family room where EVERYONE can see what you're doing online. Kids should not have a computer in their room. They should not have Internet access in their room AT ALL until they're older teens.

And 12-year-old kids shouldn't have smartphones and data plans. Any parent that gives their kids unlimited access to the Internet is asking for cyberbullying, sexting, snuff videos, porn, and other things to be in their kids' reach 24/7. Kids are smart enough to get there if you give them access.

But most of all, it's the social media crap that is causing the most damage. How many times do we need to see 12-year-olds end up on the wrong side of things or running wild because they got into something on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc.? YOUR KID DOES NOT NEED THEIR OWN ACCOUNT FOR ANY SOCIAL MEDIA.

How do kids get away with this stuff nowadays? If me or any of my fellow students even thought about calling someone a biatch we would be in for a world of shiat. Here there is physical evidence of someone calling someone else a biatch and nothing.

Spare the lash, spoil the child.

/they didn't actually hit most of us in the 80's, but the threat of such actually meant something

Everyone is going to be a dick occasionally. People have bad days, just rub each other wrong, occasionally lash out for unrelated reasons, or are just innately dicks.

A very small percentage of people have occasional bouts of depression and lack the training to deal emotionally with other people being dicks to them.

... I'm kind of thinking that if you're trying to attack the problem from the first angle that you have kind of a poor grasp of the most effective way to approach the problem. Finding the people that are screwed-up or vulnerable enough to react to teasing with catastrophic personal existence failure and patching at that end (giving them support networks artificially by enrolling them in clubs, for instance) is clearly the only remotely viable way to deal with this. "Making everyone magically never a dick" is not anywhere close to workable.

And now the mom is going to pretend to her daughter and murder the future students of Crystal Lake. But then she's going to die. But then the 12 year old daughter is going to resurrect and murder all the future students of Crystal Lake. But then she dies. But then an EMT pretends to be the daughter and kills a few students. But then he dies. But then the daughter comes back, and this time she's immortal. She takes Manhattan, she goes to Hell. And then they're in space.

EmmaLou:Girls that age are evil, evil spawns of satan. I'm sure they don't even know why they act the way they do. In my day, I could at least go home and get away from that crap. I can't imagine being that age today and having to deal with that on the phone and online.

Yeah, turning off the phone and PC is hard. If everyone that gets bullied killed themselves we would cease to exist. Some people have issues that they can't get over and we are quick to blame outside influences for what is often poor parenting. Not sure if that is the case here, but I'm finding it harder and harder to find sympathy anymore, nobody accepts any responsibilities.

These kinds of arguments always crack me up. "Children are best off with 2 parents, both a mom and a dad." Really? That doesn't depend at all on the actual quality of said parents? My dad sucked. He sucked so bad that at only 8 years old, I was glad when my parents got divorced and he moved out of the house. Like, consciously glad - I went to my bedroom and celebrated. 8 years old. My mom did a great job as a single mom, and I was way better off with my dad not there.

Single parents, foster parents, gay parents, biological parents - none of that matters. Good parents is all that matters, and that can come in many forms and quantities.

I don't condone violence, but sometimes it's necessary. I was bullied in junior high ('87). Back then, bullying consisted of prank phone calls, a punch in the arm now and then, and getting my books knocked out of my hands. There was no *69 or caller id, so the calls became quite annoying. He also stepped us game with more frequent arm punches, etc.

I never "told on him" to the school administration because I knew that would just make it worse, plus there wasn't a big focus on dealing with bullies. My dad eventually told me to just "knock his block off".

One day, Jason (bully) walks up toward me while I was near the vending machines -- POP! Clocked his ass right there in the hallway. Perhaps it was a bit of a sucker punch, but fark it, that bastard had it coming. He started crying right there in front of everyone and ran off. Problem solved.

If i had taken that route nowadays, I'd be suspended, charged, sued, and poor butthurt-feelings Jason would come to school with a gun and mow down his classmates before turning the gun on himself.

ZeroCorpse:And we ALL faced gossip and insults at school. The difference is that we went home and didn't have to hear it anymore

This isn't necessarily true. Most kids have extracurriculars and some sort of social life after school.

ArcadianRefugee:Lucifer ("Satan") doesn't wish to be worshiped; what is the point in free will if you just turn yourselves over to someone/-thing else? The whole point of that episode in Eden was to get us to think for ourselves and not follow blindly some Jackass just on His say so.

If you're not a blind follower, why did you capitalize His and Jackass?

69gnarkill69:Yeah, turning off the phone and PC is hard. If everyone that gets bullied killed themselves we would cease to exist.

Jim_Callahan:Everyone is going to be a dick occasionally. People have bad days, just rub each other wrong, occasionally lash out for unrelated reasons, or are just innately dicks.

A very small percentage of people have occasional bouts of depression and lack the training to deal emotionally with other people being dicks to them.

The two of you don't seem to get that bullying isn't just an occasional thing, and that it doesn't happen to everybody. It's not the occasional rude gesture to someone, it is systematic psychological and sometimes physical torture. Also, keep in mind the girl was twelve, she wouldn't have the same maturity or defense mechanisms to handle it as a couple of internet tough guys. Good to know that Jim_Callahan is obsessed with dicks, though.

Why does the victim of harassment need to cut themselves off from the world? I know the specific way in which 12-year-olds interact with the world is different than you, but that doesn't make it any less valid. Remember that 12-year-olds aren't allowed to drive (and don't have any money to buy other transportation) and were raised in a world where "writing" means "typing" and phone numbers belong to people not households. Try for just a second to imagine your primary means of social interaction being targeted by harassment against you and think about whether you'd be willing to give up the phone/snail mail/time at the pub/etc. in order to get away from some douchebag yelling at you before you start blaming this girl for wanting to be able to both use the Internet and not have people she knows personally tell her she should die.

I've always heard "kah kah kah kah, ch ch ch ch." Also, it doesn't matter what the composer intended, it doesn't magically change what the sound actually is. He may have WANTED it to sound like "ki ki ki ki ma ma ma ma," but that's not how it came out.

AverageAmericanGuy:This proliferation of single-parent homes in which the mother is the only one taking care of the children and fathers are only around 2 weekends a month is not only disastrous to boys, but it's also catastrophic to young girls. Without a strong, stabilizing force like a father in the home, these children are raised by mercurial women who are stretched to the limit between supporting the household by working and managing the household after work.

Who was there to talk to this girl when the bullying got too bad? Who was there to tell her that girls are idiots (no offense intended) and that this kind of stuff will pass eventually? Who was there to consider moving to another district to get her out of that poisonous school?

"I blame myself" says this girl's mother. But you can't blame the mother for everything that happened. She's at her wit's end as it is, juggling a career and motherhood.

It's tragic and indicative of a much deeper problem in American society.

I know plenty of single mothers who did just fine raising their children into healthy smart confident non-suicidal adults.

I've always heard "kah kah kah kah, ch ch ch ch." Also, it doesn't matter what the composer intended, it doesn't magically change what the sound actually is. He may have WANTED it to sound like "ki ki ki ki ma ma ma ma," but that's not how it came out.

I just don't understand how someone can be bullied online. How does that even happen? I guess facebook, but if people are acting like idiots, you block them. That's the end of that. How else can one be bullied online?